My French Broad Beatering
Drawing of Big Pillow Rapid by William Nealy from his illustrated book Whitewater Home Companion, Southeastern Rivers Volume I. This book is a treasure, and you can still get it on Amazon!
How I learned there is much more skill involved in finding my own lines than following the leader.
My first real “beatering” didn’t happen at Frank Bell’s or some other iconic rapid on French Broad 9. It’s embarrassing to admit, but it was during a long swim just above Ledges Whitewater Park, a Class II section of the river just past downtown Asheville.
Here’s how it went down: After taking a few beginner whitewater kayaking classes in August and September of 2022, I went to Florida for six months. I came back to North Carolina the following May, and I couldn’t wait to get back in my boat and paddle! My first trip was a fun six-mile Class II paddle with APEs on French Broad 11, and I had an excellent guide who showed me all of the best lines for my skill level.
Due to my success, the next week I thought I was ready for 10-mile paddle on the French Broad from Woodfin Park to Walnut Island with a new paddling group. I showed up on that chilly May morning underdressed with slip-on water shoes—and I was totally stoked to meet new people and jump on the river, which was running around 1,200 cubic feet per second (CFS). But my mood quickly changed when I discovered the water was cold, pushy and fast, and the run was “manky”: (adj.) Synonymous with very rocky or unappealing rapids.*
A few of us started having trouble with boat control when we got into rapids close to Ledges Park. Honestly, I was banging into rocks like I was inside a pinball machine. Then one paddler got stuck on a rock and panicked, and the group leader and another boater rushed over to help her. In all the commotion, I decided to eddy out behind a rock a little way downstream. A few minutes later, another kayaker pulled into the eddy with me. I started banging into her boat like I had just put another quarter in the pinball machine, so I decided to find my own line through the rest of the rapid and wait at the end.
Almost immediately, I flipped on a peel out (a classic window shade) because I couldn’t assess the strength of the current flowing between two big rocks. It happened in the blink of an eye, but I was able to make a quick wet exit and held onto my paddle. That was the easy part. Then I started moving fast—really fast—and so did my kayak. At one point, I saw my kayak travel toward me, and I thought I could grab it. I rolled over on my side and reached for the boat, but, in the process, my foot almost got entrapped in submerged rocks, and I couldn’t reach it. Luckily, the cheap water shoe ripped halfway off and my foot released. However, it was an incredibly painful moment because I had broken the second toe on that foot just a month earlier.
Tumbling through the cold water and bouncing off the rocks for more than one-eighth of a mile—I was terrified. But then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the group leader racing toward my boat—and she caught it! Not long after, I found my way to a large rock outcropping in the middle of the river, and I just sat there shaking, with my paddle still in hand, until she was able to tow over my partially water-filled kayak. We drained it on the rocks, and then I had to get back in and ferry through a rapid. I was exhausted from the swim and freezing cold, and I felt like I would never make it to the bank—and we still had five more miles to go on the trip.
Luckily, I pushed through my fear, made it to dry land, and eventually got back in the boat to finish the trip. The next day, I had a bruise the size and color of an eggplant on my upper leg, pulled something in my forearm, and could barely move the foot with the broken toe.
I was now officially a beater: (n.) A kayaker whose skill doesn’t match the level of whitewater paddled, often leading to a beat-down…*
But I wised up quick and decided to back down to Class I and easy Class II. I took another beginner clinic and a one-day swift water rescue class. I worked with an instructor one-on-one, and I practiced—a lot—over the next six months. Then I went back to Florida for the winter.
When I arrived back in North Carolina this April, once again, I couldn’t wait to get back in my boat and paddle! On the first day of APEs Spring Fling, I had a great run on the Lower Nolichucky, easily plowing through Radio Tower with the group. Due to my success, I actually considered running French Broad 9 for the first time the next day…Then I played the tape all the way through on what happened at Ledges, and I quickly decided to hold off.
I definitely made the right choice.
The following weekend I took a two-day II+ III kayaking class. The first day, we worked on paddling skills and drills on the Lower Nolichucky, and then headed downstream to scout and run Radio Tower. This time, I failed miserably because I had to find my own line through the rapid as part of the exercise; there was nobody to follow. I came in river left instead of river right of the hole—which looked like “the eye of the beast” from my vantage point. I panicked, froze, flipped, pulled the skirt, got a bad thrashing, and went for a gnarly swim. However, I also learned something extremely important:
There is a BIG difference in my perceived skill level when following experienced paddlers down a rapid vs. having to read the water myself, navigate, and find my own line—especially when things don’t go as planned—and that’s the norm not the exception.
My ego was telling me I had more skill than I truly possessed, and I needed to reevaluate where I was in the learning process. It was humbling!
On the second day of class, we headed for French Broad 9, which was running at 2,330 CFS and brown from rain the night before. Taking the Radio Tower lesson to heart, I realized that I needed to pay much more attention when scouting and paddling through bigger rapids—watching for rocks that I could and could not see, gauging my angle and edge, and staying focused on where I wanted to go. And, thankfully, I made a leap forward in my progress with some excellent instruction and support…
My redemption on Big Pillow taken by Brad Eldridge, my instructor with NOLI and APEs' current president.
…And I even redeemed myself on the largest rapid of the day, Big Pillow. I made the initial line we scouted down the tongue into the first eddy—but I came in shallow and then decided to turn out into the current and continue, but I couldn’t get my kayak angle correct to make the second eddy as planned. I was moving fast and sideways toward Big Pillow (Wesley’s Rock), which I knew would flip me if I didn’t adjust my course. On to plan B: I angled my boat left and ran over the right side of the pillow—and I landed upright in a rocky area, where I successfully managed to navigate my own line from river left to the large eddy area at river right. Success!
Stay humble friends!
*See Paddling Magazine’s Ultimate Glossary of Kayaking Slang Terms, a fun guide that will help if you’re confused trying to figure out what paddlers are saying early on. I certainly was…It’s a whole new language!
Lisa is a fellow APE who lives in Burnsville, NC. She began her whitewater journey in 2023—30 years after taking her first rafting trip on the Ocoee and falling in love with the rivers of the Southeast.
